Alectoris magna

The Great Stone Fowl is very similar to the Stone Fowl but is slightly larger and more yellow. The outer edge of the white patch on the lower face, chin and throat has a black line like a chukar, but there is also a characteristic maroon line. The lower tail coverts are mostly yellow. The naked skin around the eyes is crimson. The plumage color of the Big Rock Chicken is tan, which is relatively dark. The eyebrow lines above the eyes are black, and the black circle surrounding the throat has two layers, the inner layer is black, and the outer layer is chestnut brown, but it is incomplete and mostly broken; the black horizontal spots on both sides are more dense and dense. , there are 18 items.
Size measurements: Body weight ♂445-710g, ♀442-615g; body length ♂320-404mm, ♀330-450mm; bill peak ♂21-23mm, ♀20-22mm; wings ♂169-180mm , ♀160-172 mm; tail ♂105-122 mm, ♀90-120 mm; tarsometatarsus ♂42-47 mm, ♀38-42 mm. (Note: Male-♂; Female-♀)

The large stone partridge is endemic to China, mainly distributed in Haiyuan, Xiji, Longde in Ningxia, Lanzhou, Yuzhong, Jingyuan, Huining, Tianshui, Wushan, Zhangjiachuan, Lintao, Zhuanglang in central Gansu, and most areas of Qinghai Province.
It inhabits low mountains and hills, deserts, semi-deserts, rocky slopes, loess plateaus, loess slopes, as well as high mountain canyons and bare rock areas. It especially likes loess slopes with few plants growing and loess valleys near farmland and water sources. It likes to inhabit the sunny slopes of loess hills with early sparse plants such as Artemisia, Caragana and Stipa, the loess gullies washed by rain on the plateau, and the sunny slopes of stone mountain valleys with bare rocks covered with sparse Rosaceae shrubs. It usually avoids landscapes with dampness, thick shrubs and dense Artemisia. Except for drinking water and feeding, it rarely moves to the top of the mountain or the bottom of the ditch.

The foreign name of the large stone partridge is Rusty-necklaced Partridge, and there is no subspecies.

The large stone partridge does not have extensive migration habits, but vertical migration with seasonal changes is more obvious on the Qinghai Plateau. In spring and summer, as the weather warms up, the snow on the mountains melts, and its distribution area migrates upward, reaching the snow line, and even moving around at around 4,700 meters. In autumn and winter, as the temperature drops and the snow line moves downward, it gradually descends to the foothills or the bottom of the gully. The winter in eastern Gansu is warmer, and vertical migration is not obvious. When the snow covers the ground in winter, they wander around in search of food exposed on the ground.

The big stone partridge only moves alone or in pairs during the breeding season in spring and summer, and gathers in groups in autumn and winter. The autumn cluster is smaller, mainly composed of young birds led by parents, and usually ranges from 5 to 20. In winter, several such small groups form larger groups, and occasionally hundreds of them are seen in Qinghai, moving in the gullies between mountains. Due to the need for drinking water, they always move near streams and springs. When green plants are abundant, they are a little further away from the water source, up to 5-6 kilometers.

The Great Stone Partridge is a ground-dwelling bird with strong legs and good walking. It usually does not fly unless frightened. It often walks up the hillside. If it finds an enemy below the hillside, it will rush up the hillside, calling out as it walks, calling out to each other to warn. It is rare to walk down the hillside. If it finds an enemy above, it will either crouch and not move, or take off quickly. When it is frightened and flies away, it will make a frightened cry. It mainly flies by gliding, sliding from one hillside to another, occasionally crossing low mountain ridges, and the farthest distance does not exceed 500 meters. It rarely flaps its wings during flight, and occasionally flaps its wings 1-2 times to increase altitude or speed up. It has strong and fast flying power, but cannot last long.

The Great Stone Partridge has relatively regular activities during the day. At dawn, it calls loudly, and then starts to look for food or go to the water source to drink water. After 10 am, it stops looking for food and calling. In spring and summer, it drinks water once a day, mostly in the early morning or after foraging in the morning. Because it feeds on fresh green plants with high water content, it sometimes does not even drink water in late spring and early summer. In midsummer, it occasionally drinks more water a day. In autumn and dry winter, when it mainly feeds on plant seeds, it drinks more water a day. In winter, when the water source is frozen, it pecks at ice and snow. In spring, summer and autumn, it hides under plants or in the shade of rocks during the hot noon and does not go out to avoid the sun. In winter, it basks in the sun on the sunny side of the earthen ridge or stone cliff on the hillside at noon to avoid the severe cold. It starts to go out to forage again around 4 pm, and looks for a place to spend the night when dusk falls. At night, it usually sleeps in a pit on the steep wall of the cliff. The daytime activities are related to the weather. On rainy or snowy days, it sometimes does not go out for a whole day. In the winter when the days are short, food is hard to come by, and sometimes they run around all day looking for food. They have the habit of dust bathing. On the shady slopes of the mountains, where the sandy soil is loose, small sand pits for dust bathing are often left. Dust bathing is more common during the molting period, and there are often fallen feathers left in the pits.

There are five main types of calls for the big stone partridge. Usually "ga, ga, ga, ga, ga, ge-la, ga, ge-la, ge-la, ge-la, geh gela", with a clear rhythm, the more they call, the higher the pitch. Therefore, it is called "Gala Chicken" by the people in Gansu, Qinghai and Ningxia. When it is startled and flies up, it makes a long and rapid call of "ja-, ja-, ja...", with a rhythm and a long drag of the vowel at the back. It often makes a call of "fei-ji, fei-ji, fei-ji..." in normal flight. After breeding, when the chicks are separated, the parent bird calls the chicks, or the chicks call the parent bird, and they will make a call similar to "ge, ge, ge..." of domestic chickens. When the female bird lays eggs or hatches in the nest, the guarding male bird can make a whistle-like warning sound when it finds the enemy.

The large stone partridge is a bird with a wide variety of food, and its food types vary from time to time. Adult birds mainly feed on plants, including flowers, fruits, seeds, leaves, rhizomes and tender shoots. Animal food is very rare, mainly various insects. The food in summer is richer and more abundant than in other seasons, with as many as dozens of different parts of plants. With the emergence of various insects, the animal food of the big stone partridge also increases, especially locusts. In autumn, it mainly feeds on plant seeds and fruits, and its daily food intake increases sharply. In winter, the food variety is relatively poor, and it mainly feeds on plant seeds left on the ground and digs underground rhizomes. In spring, it mainly feeds on young leaves and buds of plants. The young birds mainly feed on animal substances within two months after hatching, and the proportion of animal food gradually decreases as the individuals grow.

The breeding period of the big stone partridge is from April to May. It is monogamous and starts singing at dawn during the estrus period. It usually nests in the bushes and grass between the rocky beaches, the base of the cliffs, the hillsides and the valleys, and also nests in the caves on the cliffs on both sides of the loess valley. Its nest is extremely simple and hidden, mainly a pit on the ground, with dead grass inside. It starts laying eggs in early May, with 5-7 eggs per nest, up to 20 eggs. The size of the eggs is 40-43.6×30-33.5 mm, and the weight of the eggs is 20-23.7 grams. The incubation period is 22-24 days. The chicks are precocial, and the chicks have light brown down feathers. The first hatched chicks do not leave the nest until all the chicks in the nest are out, and then they follow the parents. From the Qinghai Plateau to the Liupan Mountain area, the breeding period of the big stone partridge is not consistent. From west to east, as the altitude decreases, the average annual temperature and rainfall increase, and its breeding period is also advanced. On the Qinghai Plateau, they usually start to pair up and nest from the end of March to mid-April, and groups of stone partridges can be seen at the end of March. In the Liupan Mountain area, they usually start to pair up and nest from early March to mid-March.

When the big stone partridge finds an enemy attacking from the air, it often crouches and does not move, using its feather color that is very harmonious with the environment to protect it from harm. Once the adult bird leading the chicks finds the enemy, it will either lead the chicks to run quickly or lie flat on the ground with its belly, drooping one wing and flapping it on the ground to attract the enemy to itself. This gives the chicks enough time to hide. When it finds that the chicks have hidden, it will suddenly take off, often leaving the enemy empty-handed. The chicks have excellent hiding instincts and their whereabouts are unknown in a blink of an eye. When the female bird lying in the nest finds an enemy on the ground, it often does not move, or quietly leaves the nest for a distance and suddenly flies away, rarely taking off directly from the nest.

The number of big stone partridges in some areas of eastern Gansu and western Ningxia in China is still relatively abundant, but the number of individual distributions is quite small. For example, in Zhuanglang, large tracts of hills in this area have been reclaimed as farmland, the habitat has been destroyed, and the number of them has been greatly reduced due to ruthless hunting.

Listed in the "Red List of Endangered Species of the World Conservation Union" (IUCN) 2013 ver 3.1-Least Concern (LC).

Listed in the "National List of Terrestrial Wildlife with Important Economic and Scientific Research Value" (Item 80) issued by the State Forestry Administration of China on August 1, 2000.

Listed in the second level of China's "National Key Protected Wildlife List" (February 5, 2021).

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